I love good guys

I fell behind on my halfamoon '22 recommendations challenge. Here's the last.

For the seventh and final theme, "Generations," I recommend this bright, encouraging, inspiring encounter with Michelle Webster (from "Rite of Passage"). It chatters backstory as Michelle bucks herself up to face her present. She reflects a little on her parents and how she believes she failed them -- a topic perhaps still too sore -- and a great deal on her various immortal teachers, whom she has not failed. She receives a kind of generational legacy from each, but the story makes a special connection from Rebecca, to Amanda, to Michelle.

"Even Better" by Melina
~1K words
T

I'm playing halfamoon '22 as a recommendations challenge...

For the fifth theme, "Borders," I recommend one of the very best Forever Knight Captain Amanda Cohen stories. These borders are personal, emotional, and cultural. We know so little of Cohen's private life and motivations in canon -- really, just enough to know we don't know. This story picks up the slivers of Cohen's backstory, weighs the absences, and runs them brilliantly home... all within the frame of an annual precinct winter-holiday party.

"Rondeau" by tolakasa
~2K words
G

I'm playing halfamoon '22 as a recommendations challenge...

For the second theme, "Politics," I recommend this Battlestar Galactica (1978) story in which we get to re-experience early canon from the civilian side with the main female characters. While that might at first seem far from the political struggles of the Council and Commander, this story shows the grassroots as the front lines in whether and how society will rebuild.

"Ragtag" by malinaldarose
10K words
G

hlh_shortcuts has officially announced its '21 author reveals (read the post). As I type this, the stories on the AO3 still show as anonymous. But I've gone and added endnotes (they've been waiting on the guessing game), and...

I wrote "Legend Has It" (G, gen, ~3K words) (Richie, Darius, Methos, Joe, Duncan) for Black_Dwarf. For a long time, I tried to write a Methos tale, but got nowhere. In the end, a story found me that has Darius arm Richie with knowledge at "Band of Brothers," such that Richie can aim in "The Messenger" and hit in "Archangel." (Many thanks to those who spoke with me when I struggled, especially Celli and Sholio!)

Find all 18 works in this year's AO3 collection. A few that most particularly struck my own personal fancy:

• "Puissance" (unrated, gen, ~14K words) (Rebecca, Methos, John, Luther, OCs) by hafital. In the present, this rich, canon-adjacent, fix-it takes down "Legacy" and returns with a better choice available to Rebecca. Yet most of the story is in the past, building -- adventure by adventure -- an origin for Rebecca and a long friendship with Methos.


• "Little Blessings" (T, multi, ~4K words) (Methos, Duncan, OCs) by pennywashburne. These widely-staggered but consecutive and cumulative vignettes each have moods and implications of their own. The uniting conceit comes as clever and charming -- that Methos is rather the darling of long-forgotten old gods and spirits, as no one else ever calls on them anymore.


• "Reflections on the Future" (G, gen, ~1K words) (Duncan, Tessa) by dkwilliams. This was written for my prompt request. It's well-timed introspection, nestled at the very start of the series, looking out across a future yet unknown.

For those with other kinds of fancies -- all of you!?! :-D -- there's a funny time-travel escapades piece, an immortals-in-space adventure caper, a crossover with Dune and one with Sherlock and one with The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, an in-the-time-of-COVID episodic tale, several Watcher stories, a de Valincourts wedding, and more!

The 2021 retrotvexchange released on Saturday, with 24 total stories in 24 fandoms (including some crossovers). Peruse the collection. Stories remain anonymous until October 9.

The story written for my sign-up is "Time Out," a Dungeons & Dragons (the '80s cartoon) story from Diana's perspective -- yay, Diana's perspective! -- focusing on Diana and Sheila's friendship, and Diana's goals as an Olympic-caliber gymnast back in the real world.

I interpret the story as layered atop a lament for connections not quite made. It seems to me to parallel its set-up, in which Eric is focused only on himself and not Diana (to whom he's ostensibly speaking), with its main body, in which Diana tries to connect with Sheila, but is so narrowly focused on her own goal that she doesn't grasp Sheila's concerns. It's set almost immediately after the kids' time with Ramoud, when they run into Billy Whitaker in the City on the Edge of Midnight, and explores that jolt of home as a motivation in their choice to move on from Ramoud and Ayesha, to keep searching for a way home, perhaps more urgently than ever. There's a sadness, mostly Sheila's, of reaching out and not finding the person to whom you're reaching, reaching back.

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Some other stories from the exchange that I've enjoyed so far: "Diplomacy" (ST:TOS, ~4K words), "Yarn Over, Pull Through" (Starman, ~3K words), "and pretend like there's no world outside" (As Time Goes By, ~1K words).